"One noteworthy observation at December’s AGU conference – the latest and largest ever gathering of earth and space scientists – was the attention being given to a threat conceivably worse than carbon dioxide. In numerous talks, during poster sessions and over coffee, scientists were discussing methane – a greenhouse gas with a warming potential 25 times that of CO2.
Researchers have long speculated that climate change will unleash vast stores of the gas from where it lies frozen beneath the sea floor and locked up in the Arctic, triggering rapid warming.
Until recently, however, there has been little cause for concern. But that could all be changing, reports Amanda Leigh Mascarelli in a feature online today (no subscription required). Several observations made in 2007 to 2008 and reported at the AGU suggest that we could be in danger of waking a sleeping giant. "
- Continuar a ler em Climate Feedback: A sleeping giant?
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